I can live with a CFL over my work bench. When it's too noisy, I just turn it off and let the warm glow of my energy hog tube scope light the room. What I can't live with is the possibility of burning down the house because of CFLs. None of my ceiling fixtures are ventilated, something I understand will cause CFLs to fail. I don't use them there, nor will I leave one on unattended when we leave the house. Nothing guarantees they will fail in a benign manner.
If you want to see something illuminating about energy, read Don Lancaster's #71 pub on energy at his Guru's Lair site. Everything the politicians "know", is wrong.
If you want to see something illuminating about energy, read Don Lancaster's #71 pub on energy at his Guru's Lair site. Everything the politicians "know", is wrong.
Eva said:
With sincere apologies to the thread-starter for this short off-topic excursion.
What a surprise, and does such a comment or your 'echo' add to this thread in any useful manner, or could it just be antagonistic?
Actually, I am surprised that none of your clever pals has told you that there should be a "D" at the end of the word "use" which you show in your signature. I know that you are not a native English speaker, which is why I have not mentioned it before out of politeness, but it should read "used" to make any sense, and I would like to help you with impressing other Forum members.
Regards,
Why don't we ban copper too? It's poisonous! Oh, wait. All metals are poisonous in some way. Ban all metals!
I think it is unjustified to sacrifice the reliability of electronics like this, the electronics industry uses something like only 1% of all lead that is used. The alternatives seems to have huge problems. You'd have to eat the leaded solder or something equally insane to get poisoned.
Eva: I've noticed ringing from my desktop lamp which is a conventional ballast fluorescent. I get blips on the scope without even attaching the probe lead to the scope!
Yes, the lamp is noname cheap junk.
I think it is unjustified to sacrifice the reliability of electronics like this, the electronics industry uses something like only 1% of all lead that is used. The alternatives seems to have huge problems. You'd have to eat the leaded solder or something equally insane to get poisoned.
Eva: I've noticed ringing from my desktop lamp which is a conventional ballast fluorescent. I get blips on the scope without even attaching the probe lead to the scope!
Yes, the lamp is noname cheap junk.
megajocke said:
Eva: I've noticed ringing from my desktop lamp which is a conventional ballast fluorescent. I get blips on the scope without even attaching the probe lead to the scope!
The voltage across the lamp suffers an abrupt polarity change with ringing everytime the ballast current crosses through zero. Starters include a capacitor to reduce dV/dt but it actually becomes quite ineffective and trades a lower ringing frequency for stronger ringing. You may wish to check if this fluorescent system has a power factor correction capacitor fitted, as it could improve EMI by confining some of the RF in the lamp-ballast loop.
Ironically, a good high-frequency switching mode ballast may produce less EMI (plus the usual advantages: increased light output, longer lamp life, fixed starting time, less power wasted as heat, etc...)
So who among us will be first to light their home with these?
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/Architecture
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/news/4/12/19
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/Architecture
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/news/4/12/19
Eva said:
It's a tabletop lamp with a 1 metre cable (antennae!) connecting the ballast to the lamp.
I doubt the capacitor can fix that! I think I'll replace it with an incandescent or halogen bulb, the fluorescent flickers erratically too. But that seems to be a problem with the mains power, the lamp in the bathroom does it too. The mains voltage waveform looks almost like a trapezoid... Is it supposed to be like that? (The requirement for PFC in new products might not be as stupid as RoHS though!)
djQUAN said:
then they'll have to ban CCFL's.
Haha!
But I believe the power factor is pretty good to begin with though, good luck getting a big filter capacitor in there. If the filter capacitor is reduced in value the power factor will be better at the expense of 100Hz flicker, which might not be a problem. It's all those computers and TVs that mess up our mains waveform.But really, I think it's quite stupid cramming those electronics into the base of the lamp with almost no cooling. An external ballast will last longer with the same components and there will be no problem fitting a PFC correction circuit. And when the lamp goes out you don't have to replace the ballast. Why do we have to use the edison type screw base for fluorescents? It's a wonder it has not been banned due to its easily accessible live parts. Even worse than the standard US mains plug that you can pull out a bit and connect your europlug at a right angle to it.
Eva said:
There are three color temps available here in the local big box hardware store, Home Depot. Cool White, Bright White and Warm White. Cool white looks bluish and is very high color temp. Bright white is closest to incandescent and Warm white is too orange for good color rendering. It's akin in °K to a dim incandescent.
Unfortunately, many of the "name brands" such as Phillips are terrible in color rendering and start-up (very dim, increasing in brightness).
Seen on the new packaging of GE's compact fluorescents -- words to the effect of -- and I paraphrase: don't use these things near sensitive electronic devices -- they emit in a range of 500kHz to 30MHz -- most of the a.m. broadcast band, short wave listening and ham frequencies.
FWIW, our town dump just posted a sign that they will no longer take fluorescents or their CF variety.
just what we need, more e-crud -- gonna be great for the old hammond transformers, however.
and I note that CFL's should not be used in recessed fixtures -- they can overheat. this was pointed out in EDN back in October and is now on the packaging.
FWIW, our town dump just posted a sign that they will no longer take fluorescents or their CF variety.
just what we need, more e-crud -- gonna be great for the old hammond transformers, however.
and I note that CFL's should not be used in recessed fixtures -- they can overheat. this was pointed out in EDN back in October and is now on the packaging.
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